How “Queen of the Hill” can help fix our highways

Congress should adopt this bipartisan solution to save the Highway Trust Fund from a looming shutdown.

Late last week, Rep. Reid Ribble (R-Wis.) and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.), along with a bipartisan group of their colleagues, sent a letter to Speaker John Boehner and Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi calling for a novel way to break the impasse on the Highway Trust Fund – a procedure called “Queen of the Hill.” This somewhat obscure legislative procedure could hold the key to a long-term, sustainable solution to ensure that existing construction projects can continue and new, growth-generating projects can begin.

It’s no secret that the Highway Trust Fund has structural issues that need to be fixed. Worse yet, the failure of Congress to deal with these structural problems has led to the pending expiration of the trust fund on July 31.